A few takes on the classic:

The Winner

When Boyd Duckett walked across the stage on day 1 he had a spring in his step. The guy looked confident, he looked calm, he looked like a guy who could win and sure enough he did. I'd never heard of the guy before the Classic but you have to hand it to him, he caught the big fish 2 out of 3 days and he won. Something tells me he didn't win by luck.

Skeet

Skeet strikes me as someone who keeps himself emotionally detached from the fishing, and I don't mean that in a bad way. He seemed very casual for the first two days and you could almost sense that he was doing that to stay on an even keel and avoid making some nervous mistake while fishing. When he finished just short was when you could tell how much he really did care. You can't help but feel for the guy, just like when Aaron came in 2nd so many times. That's part of what makes the Classic so great though, the guys fishing it are laying it all out trying to win - and it shows.

As an aside, they showed some footage of the areas in the river where Skeet and some of the other guys were fishing. There was some seriously knarly cover in there, absolutely the kind of place where you might get busted off by a fish. Skeet said a few fish 'took his gear' on day 1. Makes you wonder what line test and brand and type he was using. And he wasn't the only one who mentioned getting broken off during the tournament. You would think at that level these guys would not break off very often but they do. I would sure like to know exactly how and why that kind of stuff keeps happening.

Swindle

Clearly he deserved the DQ. If you watch the video of it, what he did was just bonehead in light of the BASS rules. There's no possible excuse for not knowing the rules when you are fishing for $500,000.

At the day 2 weigh in, Gerald made a comment to the effect that if he had come off pad he would have thrown a bigger wake on Randy Howell, but that ignores the fact that if he had stopped short and idled past at a no-wake speed he wouldn't have thrown anything. I almost felt bad for him when he cried on stage, no doubt the guy was torn up, but my wife's 6th grade students cry when they screw up and get caught too. The right thing to do is to not make the mistake in the first place.

I do think the punishment from BASS of losing that day's catch was fair in light of the infraction. Too bad that coverage of one guy's bonehead boat driving move wasted so much coverage that could have been dedicated to the fishing.

Fish Care

Ok, I know BASS wants to call a dead fish a, "fish care penalty" but a dead bass is a dead bass. Call it a dead bass please.

As a fisherman I know that catching a bass, carting it around in a livewell, then weighing it in with 5 other bass is going to stress the fish to some extent. But I know that with proper handling those bass will go back to the lake to be caught again and again. I fish tournaments and I don't feel bad about it.

However! The whole bit where guys run around the stage waving the bass like homerun hankies is pretty weak. Think about it this way... The guy waving his fish around the stage is the same guy who would be sick to his stomach seeing a stringer of bass hanging off the side of someone's boat waiting for the fry pan. I don't understand that disconnect. If you respect your quarry, show it by handling the fish correctly, don't cock the jaw back and trot around the stage.

Getting to see the fish in the clear box during the weigh in is cool and all, but for a tournament org like BASS that places a huge emphasis on conservation, wouldn't it make sense to weigh the fish in a bag? Watch the weigh in for a FLW National Guard tournament and you will see an organization that doesn't just give lip service to fish care, they do things right by weighing the fish in bags, quickly, and even going so far as to do the live tank weigh in on the final day. BASS could boost their credibility in my eyes by doing the same.

The Berkeley Paca Chigger

Bassfan.com reports the winning baits to be a Rattle Trap and a Berkley Chigger Craw. Berkeley will no doubt sell a bucket load of Chigger Craws as a result of this tournament. So you know who I feel bad for? The guy who invented the Paca Craw. Why? Because the Chigger Craw is a bait that got designed because Berkeley Pro Staff guys wanted to be able to fish Paca Craws but couldn't do it on TV at the Classic. A blurb on Bassfan.com all but spelled that out a few days before the classic. I have no affiliation with Net Bait, I'm just telling it like it is.

Ike

Speaking of telling like it is, whether you love him or hate him, Ike tells it like it is. His comment at the day 2 weigh in that if Bass fishing was going to be a real sport, the competitors needed to be fishing out of their own boats was one of those comments that half the field is probably thinking but doesn't have the balls to say. Ike had a point.

The Future of Professional Fishing

As awesome as the Classic is, bass fishing still has a long ways to go. Right now there are two competing circuits, both offering a half million dollar first prize for their largest tournament. Right now there is no World Series of bass, no Superbowl, no NBA Finals. There's no venue where the best in the world (as determined by a rigorous qualifying procedure) can go head to head. Yeah most of the best guys are fishing BASS, but there's some mega sticks in the FLW too. Until there is consolidation at the highest levels of the sport, bass fishing will be viewed as second rate sport.

The other reality of professional fishing is that to compete at the highest levels you have to have one of two things: A lot of money and time, or a willingness to gamble your future on your fishing abilities at risk of going broke. In other sports, if you are the best in the world you will make it no matter how much money and time you have. If you can throw a 103mph fastball and break off a mean slider, it doesn't matter if you're living in a cardboard box, you'll get a shot at the bigs. If you can golf like Tiger Woods, you'll get paid big money to do it. If you can run the ball like Reggie Bush, someone will recruit you and if you keep it up, you'll be rich.

In fishing, you can have all the natural talent and fishing catching ability in the world, but if you don't have the entry fees and the time - or you aren't willing to risk financial ruin, you're sitting on the outside looking in. In real sports, the best in the world compete because they are the best, not because they had $55k to burn and the time to make it happen. It's a shame that when we watch the biggest fishing tournaments in the world, we probably aren't watching the best bass fishermen in America.

Closing

I love watching the Classic because I love to watch people give their all in sports. The coverage could always be better but the live internet stream gave you a pretty clear idea what was going down and I enjoyed it.

I believe that some day bass fishing will have a single league, based on talent, that will crown a top angler and honor them with a tremendous cash prize. I don't know if it will happen in 2 years or 20 but I look forward to that day.